Mirabile (33 page)

Wait till you see it! It’s an ugly sucker!”

“Thought I told you not to mess with ugly suckers,” I said. I jabbed a finger in the direction of her leg. “Did you bite it first or did you bite it back?”

She made a face at me. “Neither,” she said, defensively.

I nodded. “Okay, kiddo. Lemme see.” I dropped to one knee, pried at the bandage for a glimpse of the wound itself.

Elly slapped my hand away. “Doc Agbabian just put that on—you leave it alone, Annie.” Her smile of relief took the sting out of the command.

“What kind of wound?”

I’d addressed nobody in particular, but Elly shoved Agbabian at me. He held his fingers some three inches apart and said, “Two opposing slash marks. If there’d only been one I’d have taken it for a knife wound, but broader. She’s lucky it missed the tendon. It was just a matter of gluing her back together.”

I could feel my shoulders relax. “Okay, then. Tell me what happened, Jen—everything!”

She didn’t need asking twice. “Mabob and I were out picking blueberries. You know where we
Page 130

pick blueberries, don’t you?”

I nodded and felt my shoulders tense up all over again. “Hold up,” I said.

“Where’s Mabob? Did he get hurt too?”

Jen said quickly, “He’s fine—he’s helping Noisy stalk the Dragon’s Tooth.

Lemme tell ya what he did, okay?”

“Go.”

“So we were picking blueberries, only Mabob was eating more than I could pick, and we found this hole in the ground.” Jen held her hands to describe a six-inch round. “

Big hole. I never saw anything lived in a hole that big. So Mabob wanted to look in the hole…”

Well, I’ve seen Mabob poke his beak down rat holes often enough I’d have believed it, if Jen hadn’t ducked her head at just that point in her tale. Sounded to me like poor Mabob was going to take the rap for this one. I raised an eyebrow at her, but I didn’t say anything.

Jen looked up at Elly suddenly. “It wasn’t Mabob who wanted to look,” she said.

“It was me. I thought I was being careful.”

She looked at me again. “I didn’t get very close at all, that’s the thing. Maybe as close as Susan is to me”—about three feet, that made it—“so not too close.”

I nodded. “I’d have thought that safe myself. So what happened?”

Her face furrowed. “It made another hole—the Dragon’s Tooth, I mean. It came right up out of the ground next to me and it grabbed my leg and it hurt something awful and I screamed and then Mabob pecked it right in the eye! And the Dragon’s Tooth let go and we ran away!”

Then she took a breath—which she must have needed after all that—and leaned back in the chair, waiting for my reaction.

I gave her the proper one—I whistled. Then I said, “Did you get a look at it at all?”

“Yeah,” she nodded vigorously. “It was ugly like I told you.”

I snorted. “‘Ugly’ doesn’t give me much to go on. I can think of lots of ugly critters—some of which are Earth-authentic.”

“Okay, you win.” She closed her eyes, then opened one just a slit, as if she didn’t really want to look at it again. “It was hairy and it had little tiny mean eyes. Had kind of floppy ears, like the Bhattacharyas’ dog does. Had these big long teeth, just here.” She opened her eyes long enough to jam her index fingers to her mouth, like huge canines jutting up from the lower jaw. “But curly.” She bent her fingers to demonstrate.

I made a face back at her. “Ugly, all right.”

“Wait, Mama Jason—you haven’t heard the worst part.” She squinted again then opened her eyes till they bugged with excitement. “Two worst parts. It had these big squarish front paws, almost like flippers, but with long claws on them. And it had this nose—”

Words failed her. She made a circle of her hands again, this time holding it out in front of her face. “Only not like a real nose.” One hand still circled, she moved the other to cut flat across in front. “Like somebody’d chopped it off flat—all raw grey and round, with two holes punched into it to breathe.”

“If there’s a prize for ugly,” I said, “that wins.” I got to my feet. “Now I think I’ll have a look for myself. I need a cell sample.” I grinned at Jen. “We’ll see if its genes are as ugly as its snoot.”

There was a tap at my elbow. It was Ilanith, grinning real hard. “I’m way ahead of you, Mama Jason. Its genes are as ugly as its snout.” To Jen, she added, “And, yup, it’s a Dragon’s Tooth, all right.”

That pleased Jen no end—extra points for getting chewed by something nobody else has ever been chewed by, I guess.

Didn’t please me. At least, the implications didn’t. I fixed Ilanith with the hairy eyeball I’d learned from Susan and growled, “How in hell’d you get a cell sample?”

Elly had fixed her with an even hairier eyeball. If that kid thought getting the sample was risking life and limb, wait’ll she saw what Elly and I were going to do to her for risking it.

“Quit scowling, both of you,” Ilanith said. “Mabob got the sample for me. He stripped a whole chunk off the Dragon’s Tooth when he pecked it. After Jen said what happened, I cleaned Mabob’s beak for him. That’s where I got the sample I fed to the analyzer.”

Much relieved, I grinned at Susan over Ilanith’s head. “That’s what I like,” I said.

“Somebody who’s way ahead of me.”

“Me too,” said Susan. “Let’s see it, Ilanith.”

“Here?” Ilanith cast a glance around the room, taking in all the onlookers.

“They’ll feel better if they know what we’re up against, too.”

“Yeah,” she admitted. “Guess you’re right.”

I gave her too much smug (deliberately) and said, “Of course.”

She giggled and headed for the lobby desk and swung the computer around so everybody could see the screen. A few taps at the keyboard brought up her gene-read.

Chimera, no doubt about it. Not often you see that much of a mismatch. Still, from Jen’s evidence, the damn thing was all too viable.

Ilanith sprawled across the desk and jabbed a finger at the screen. “I found out where this part of it came from. Here, I’ll show you.” Another stretch and another tap and there was a second gene-read on the screen. She highlighted the bits in common.

“Right about that, too,” said Susan. “What’s that when it’s Earth-authentic, Ilanith?”

“Disgusting,” said Ilanith. By way of proof, she called up its photo from ships’

files. The face was every bit as bizarre as the one Jen had worked so hard to describe.

“Lemme see,” said Jen. Elly got a supporting arm under her shoulder, and she-hopped over, wincing all the way. I moved aside to give her a clear view of the screen.

Jen nodded fiercely. “That’s it, Ilanith!” She hopped two steps closer, staring.

Elly, with a grunt, hoisted her onto the edge of the desk, where she peered at the screen a moment more and then said, “That’s the face, but the feet are all wrong.”

“Of course the feet are all wrong. You could have told that by the gene-read,”

Ilanith told her scornfully.

Jen deflated. “Could I have, Mama Jason?”

“Only after lots of practice,” I said.

That mollified her. “Okay, I’ll practice lots

.” She gave another look at the screen.

“So what is it, Ilanith, if you know so much?”

“It’s a wild boar, and even when it has Earth-authentic feet it can dig like a plough. It eats just about anything a human being will eat and then some, and it especially likes roots—so it’s all adapted to dig stuff up with its snout.”

“‘Snoot,’” corrected Jen, with a glance at me.

“Ships’ files say ‘snout,’” Ilanith told her—then she looked at me, too, and both of them waited for me to arbitrate.

“Whichever,” I said. I’d been reading the entry on the screen, which finally twitched my memory so I had some idea what we had here. “Pigs,” I said, thinking out loud.

From somewhere in the crowd, Chris said, “Pigs? As in pork?” She shoved through for a look, her eyes wider than Jen’s, which I hadn’t thought possible.

“Yeah,” said Ilanith. “The files say wild boar is edible, too—‘pork’ is the word they use.”

I haven’t seen Chris that excited since we made her official cook for the team.

“Pork! You wouldn’t believe how many recipes there are in ships’ files for pork,”

she said. “Oh, you’ve got to keep them, Annie!”

Jen caught her eye.

“Oops,” said Chris. “I knew it chewed you, Jen. But it seems to me only fair that you should get a taste of !”

it

Jen shook her head. “The thing that chewed me isn’t pork, Chris. It’s a Dragon’s Tooth. Maybe it’s not edible at all.”

“Oh.” Chris’s face fell.

Susan patted her on the back. “Don’t worry, Chris,” she said, “we’ll see what we can do for you.”

Good a place as any to get the show back on the road. “Ilanith, shoot a copy of your gene-reads back to the lab for Mike, then see if you can find out anything about the other half of the chimera. It’s a mammal—”

“Hardly narrows the field,” said Ilanith.

“—But from Jen’s description of the feet, it’s a burrowing mammal, which does narrow the field some. See what you can find. Maybe Mike will have some suggestions for you.”

I made a shooing motion to set her about the job then turned to Susan. “You’re the expert at tracking down the origins of newly sprung critters—think you might be able to do it for a Dragon’s Tooth?”

She’d have preferred to stalk the beast in the flesh, but the challenge was too much for her. “If it can be done, I’ll do it,” she said. “Elly, what computer shall I use?”

Elly sent her off to the one in her own bedroom, after first disarming her. Susan gave her the hairy eyeball for that, but Elly was immune from long exposure.

“Aklilu’s at the age he plays with anything,” Elly said. “I don’t want firearms unattended while you concentrate on a computer screen.”

“Gotcha,” said Susan.

As long as I had so many helping hands, I went right on making use of them.

“Chris, if you’ll make us up a collection of pork recipes, that’d be a help. Stick to things you’ve got everything but the pork for, though.”

Jen had been looking increasingly anxious each time I parceled out a job, so I turned to her next. “Jen? You up to doing a computer search?” Her leg probably hurt like hell, but doing something might help take her mind off it.

She must have thought so, too, because she brightened and said, “Sure! What should I do?”

“You just learned how to read secondary and tertiary helices, right? Then you find out for me what’s likely to be the next beast we get if your Dragon’s Tooth breeds.”

“Yeah! I can do that!”

“Then get to work, while I hunt up Leo and see what he’s found out about your Dragon’s Tooth.”

I had a spate of offers of help to hunt down the beast, but I sidetracked ’em all into standing guard on the lodge, where they’d be more use and less likely to get in the way. Then I went out to track Leo.

I found him not far from the blueberry patch. Mabob bugged a brilliant orange eye at me but gave me no welcoming gronk. For Mabob to keep quiet meant he was stalking prey. I joined them on the skulk. Leo flickered a glance at me and pointed-—the same direction he had his gun leveled.

I didn’t see anything, not even the sort of hole in the ground Jen had described, but Mabob cocked his head and took a step in my direction. Leo shifted his aim.

I brought my persuader into the same line without even thinking about it. I watched where Mabob watched, which is easy enough to do, because those orange eyes bulge to cones and focus visibly on his target.

Then I saw the ground surge. Well, if the damn thing made holes, maybe it burrowed through the ground as a general practice. The ground heaved up again, a little closer to where I stood, and Mabob followed, soundlessly picking closer to it on his huge taloned feet. Every time the ground bulged, so did his eyes.

To let Leo know my policy on this one, I snapped the safety off my gun.

The ground at my feet exploded upwards—I got a flash of tusk and snout and claw—and squeezed the trigger full into its face.

Leo fired at the same time. Bits of Dragon’s Tooth and dirt showered us all.

By the time I’d spit out the mouthful of crud, the critter was still twitching—but given that we’d blown most of its head away, it was no longer in the dangerous category. Mabob gave the remains a vicious clout with one clubbed foot, then cocked his head at me and said, “GRONK!”

in hundred-decibel triumph.

“Gronk is right,” I told him, my ears ringing.

“They react to sound above ground,” Leo said. “Remember that next time, Annie: don’t wait till you’re close to take the safety off your gun.”

I nodded and knelt for a close look at what was left of Jen’s Dragon’s Tooth. I’d seen those flipper-like front paws somewhere before, in ships’ files if not in real life.

You couldn’t have built a critter better adapted for burrowing if you’d started from scratch—certainly I couldn’t have and I’m not the least bit ashamed to say I’m good at what I do.

Leo said, “And you’ve got to step more lightly. Both that thing”—he gave it a tap with his toe—“and Mabob heard you coming before I did. The Dragon’s Tooth shifted course to stalk you. If‘stalk’ is what I mean when it’s done from below.”

I nodded again and rooted out what remained of the Dragon’s Tooth. It had stopped twitching.

I stood up, holding the critter by its twist of a tail, and gave Leo a kiss hello, never mind the dirt and all.

Mabob gronked again. He gets an enormous kick out of our necking for some reason I’ll never know.

Leo’s smile brightened up my whole day. Best thing about a well-worn face like Leo’s is that it’s got all the laugh lines well worn in for extra emphasis. After a moment, he turned to Mabob. “I know what you mean, Mabob, but you’d better hush before you attract a dozen more of those things our way.”

He let go my shoulder to replace the spent cartridge in his shotgun. I took the cue and did the same. “How many more?”

“I don’t know for sure. But I don’t see how one could have done all the damage we found. We picked this one to track because it looked as if it were on its own. I was hoping to find a way to bring one back alive for you.”